Tuesday, 12 February 2008

Hillary might not make it to Ohio

By all accounts Hillary Clinton is now staking it all on the states of Ohio and Texas whose primaries are on March 4th.

Clearly both are important states with lots of delegates and whoever wins them will be a big step closer to the nomination. But can Hillary afford to wait for these states? Since the score draw on Super Tuesday, Obama has swept the board, winning in Louisiana, Nebraska, Washington and Maine. Before March 4th, there will be today's contests in DC, Maryland and Virginia, as well as Hawaii and Wisconsin next Tuesday. The serious talk is that Obama will win all 10 of these contests.

Now I know that the race cannot technically be won between now and March 4th, but if you are looking at momentum then a clean sweep for Obama can only have one outcome - desolation for Clinton.

Who was the last person to ignore so-called small states and gamble everything on key contests some way in the future? Step backwards Rudy Guiliani.

The US opinion polls may well be saying that it is a dead heat but the betting market tells a different story. A campaign which fires its manager and decides to adopt a high risk make or break strategy seems to be already to be toast.

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